Customer Reviews

MEXICAN LIVING Blogging It From a Third World Country

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I bought this book after having read a brief excerpt and thought it might be an interesting read. Unfortunately, I should have read a little more before buying it.

I was hoping it would humorous and informative, but it was barely that. Bower spends more time ranting about how ugly Americans can be and expressing his own political views than he does on actually living in Mexico. I am from America, I know how ugly Americans are. Tell me more annecdotes about Mexicans and Mexico.

Aside from the rants, Bowers also seemed not to have proof read his book. Not only are there numerous typos, but he even repeats an entire chapter. Chapter 41 is repeated (except with a different chapter title and number) verbatim. Come on!

I am interested in moving to Mexico and was looking forward to reading this book, but I came away extremely disappointed.

If you are looking for humorous travelogues, might I suggest you read the following:

"Holy Cow: An Indian Adventure" by Sarah Macdonald

and also "The Sex Lives of Cannibals" and "Getting Stoned with Savages" by J. Maarten Troost.

These are well written, fun, and informative.

If you want to learn more about moving to Mexico, read "Adapter Kit: Mexico: A Traveler's Tools for Living Like a Local" by Ken Luboff. It's a serious guide for moving to Mexico and is much more informative than Bowers' "Mexican Living".

I am familiar with the area of Mexico about which Mr. Bower writes. While I don't share all of his opinions, they are valid. Some articles (and remember he states this is a book created from articles he has written) are laugh-out-loud funny. Some are troubling. All are thought provoking. He has not marketed this book as containing exclusive information not available anywhere else, but his opinions are certainly his own; the result of his personal journey which none of us can totally share. But we can all enjoy it.

In the genre of memoir travel writing, Blogging South of the Border: Notes from a so-called Third-World Country debuts as a significant competitor for the Social Humor Commentary of the decade in Mexican and American relations. Author Doug Bower, an American expatriate, bobs and weaves, in and out, over and under the multitude of cultural comparisons he makes between the two cultures. He shares his observations of life in a Third World Country critically and humorously. He takes no prisoners.

After a lifetime of living in the U.S., Bower and his wife of 22 years moved to Guanajuato, Mexico, to spend the rest of their days. Both are writers. Blogging South of the Border: Notes from a so-called Third-World Country, originally meant to be a column, blew up into a full-sized book. This collection of daily essays is taken from Bower's daily grind as an American expatriate.

Blogging South of the Border: Notes from a so-called Third-World Country is a delightful and gentle union of humor and serious contemplation of what life is really like in Mexico. Nothing is spared--from dog poop on the sidewalks to mountains of bloodied meat sitting in the back of a truck outside your local butcher shop. Constant comparison is made between life in America and that in Mexico.

Bower also constantly examines the relationship between a Mexico-ignorant America and how that works out in issues such as The Minuteman Project, The Ugly American Syndrome, NAFTA, monolingualism in America, and the Americanization of Mexico.